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Hachioji Park, Sunday 27th September
Div 3 may occasionally be a wee bit short on skill and speed. This week it wasn’t short of either, but it was short on time. The match between the Jets 2nds and the Stoneds ended after about an hour’s play in a 2-2 draw.
Stoneds began the game strongly and showed good skill and pace, while the Jets looked firm in defence. Stoneds broke through first as Gould saved well but parried the ball to a Stoned and it got poked home. The Jets didn’t lose heart and played the ball around nicely. The equalizer came from a neat move, which started at the back. Simon sent the ball up the line to Gildart who made a great run at the Stoneds’ defense then laid a nice ball back to Piper, who as usual was skulking at the edge of the box to place it in the far corner. This gave the Jets a boost and they dominated the game for a while, with Gildart almost battling his way through on a couple of occasions. Then out of nowhere Fancutt laid a simple ball into the midfield to Garner who strapped on his rocket boots, looked up and smashed a cracking long range effort from all of 30 yards or so into the top corner leaving the keeper nowhere. 2-1 Jets. The Jets perhaps deserved to go in ahead at halftime and were still pressing for a third, when they were caught short on the break. 2-2. The second half saw the Stoneds pushing for a win and the Jets looking to hit on the break all to no avail.
The game ended rather ignominiously as the time the pitch was booked for ran out and the ref blew for full time fifteen minutes early. Both teams felt slightly aggrieved, one of the Stoneds so much so that he looked as if his spleen might explode as he swore in Japanese at the bewildered ref for ten minutes after the game in a frightful show of temper tantrums. In fairness to the ref, it was not his fault (not being able to control the space-time vortex) and he actually had a pretty good game.
The Jets take heart from another decent performance, another point and some enjoyable footie. The Jets went for the usual post footie pints and something really rather amusing happened involving Simon and a… Oh, time up..
Report by Chris Piper
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HACHIOJI PARK WARNING!!!
It is your responsibility to make sure that you and your players clear up after your game regardless of whether you're the first team on or the last. If there's one PET bottle or can left on the field after TML has finished using the ground we'll be PERMANENTLY BLACKLISTED - we've been told so.
And that's just the field... We've found out that the changing room is NOT in fact a changing room - it's a COMMUNAL area. Last weekend there were young girl teams playing on the sub-field and using the COMMUNAL area. We received a MONUMENTAL complaint about players getting changed in the communal area and outside near the pitches. From now on when girls or children are playing, TML players are to change in the SHOWER area, there is to be no undressing in the COMMUNAL area - as bizarre as this may sound and players MAY NOT get changed outside the COMMUNAL area or pitch-side.
As for the showers, do not leave empty shampoo or shower bottles in the shower - this is a disgrace.
Captains and players: we have one last chance chance. Just one. One PET bottle, one shampoo bottle... And that's it, NO MORE HACHIOJI. Seriously. From now on the last teams of the day MUST CHECK with the office before they leave that everything is in order. IF THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN AT EVERY GAME WE'RE OUT. No more Hachioji, no more astroturf.
Footy Japan KK.
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